In an attempt to meet the shortage of coins State Bank of India's main branch at Bistupur in association with the Singhbhum Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) on Tuesday organised a coin disbursement mela wherein coins worth Rs 12 lakh of various denominations ( Rs 1, Rs 2, Rs 5 and Rs 10) were disbursed among local traders. A total of 330 traders were benefitted from the initiative.
Senior bank officials including the assistant general manager, Vikas Kumar and representatives of SCCI including its honorary general secretary Vijay Anand Moonka were present on the occasion. The coins were disbursed from three hours from noon.
The consignment of coins was sent by the Patna circle of the Reserve Bank of India. Honorary general secretary Vijay Anand Moonka said that the scarcity of small denominated coins is affecting business operations. Chamber had made a formal request to RBI to allocate coins.
He also made appeal to people who usually kept their coins in their homes, particularly in piggy banks as well as charitable institutions whose collections consist of coins. The habit of keeping coins at home, he said, is probably the foremost cause of the shortage.
According to Moonka, due to the efforts of the trade body several branches of nationalised banks have installed coin vending machines, which is a permanent solution to tackle the crisis. Vikas Kumar, assistant-general manager of SBI, Jamshedpur branch, said they are monitoring the situation and if required request for another consignment of coins will be made to the RBI.
“During interaction he promised to release more coins to different banks in the city. Earlier too Chamber had taken up the matter with the RBI requesting to release Re 1, Rs 2 and Rs 5 coins in the market for the problem being faced by medicine shops, grocery shops, and other retail outlets along with the public in general,” said a chamber official.
Due to shortage of coins in the region several traders have resorted to use of tokens or candies clear amount to customers.